While there is much enthusiasm surrounding experimental new techniques that aim to help women with severely mutated mitochondrial DNA to have a child that would not inherit the disorders that can be caused by those mutations, the verdict is still out on the procedures. And it doesn’t look good.

Logically, all women receiving abortion care should also receive contraceptive information, and a method if they wish one; likewise, family planning providers should be equipped to support women who have unintended pregnancies. However, integrating family planning and abortion care is often a challenge.

In November of 2012, the Center for Reproductive Rights and National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health (NLIRH) came together to conduct a human rights investigation in the Rio Grande Valley to capture the stories of some of the women most affected by funding cuts and other policy changes to reproductive health. With the closure of family planning clinics and loss of services in the Valley, women are educating one another about their reproductive health and mobilizing their communities to advocate for policies that uphold their human right to health. This is Nuestro Texas. (Video produced by Intercultural Productions.)

Miriam Zoll’s horrifying personal story about using a host of assisted reproductive technologies, including in vitro fertilization and egg donation, in an effort to have a child is part memoir and part exposé of an unscrupulous, high-profit industry. It’s a compelling read.

The anti-choice maneuvers we’ve seen in Texas and elsewhere recently are the progeny of the Global Gag Rule, which has resulted in major losses of critical reproductive health services around the world. An act introduced in the House Thursday would permanently repeal the Gag Rule.

Your story, of your family struggling to make ends meet, and of the lack of education about sexual and reproductive health, is all too common for young Latinas all over this country—though it’s not always a story that is spoken of out loud.

I have been asked to suggest how we constructively engage women in Maternal Newborn and Child Health issues as “more than patients,” so I have come up with six suggested steps that we might all take together to achieve success.